This copy is for your personal non-commercial use only. To order
presentation-ready copies of Toronto Star content for distribution
to colleagues, clients or customers, or inquire about
permissions/licensing, please go to: www.TorontoStarReprints.com

Toronto art in 2018 was a year of opening doors and rising stars

When I think back on the year in art in Toronto — the memorable exhibitions, the events that had significant impact on the city’s creative communities and beyond — I think about doors.

How the doors, for example, of some exciting institutions, exhibitions and programs opened for the very first time; or reopened after long hiatuses; or were asked to stay open longer by popular demand. I think about the doors that were enabled, by the determination of a community, to stay open, period, against threat of closure.

From the calendar’s early pages, the city was polka-dotted — as were our social media feeds — gripped by Kusama-mania. Meanwhile, the Bentway served reason to venture beneath the Gardiner, the Toronto Sculpture Garden on King St. E. was resurrected and, after a series of delays, the Museum of Contemporary Art Toronto debuted its new home and identity with a tremendous splash. (Enthusing about this Year of the Open Door, I think also about those that closed: as I write, the Ford government just announced a $5-million cut to the Ontario Arts Council and suspended the Indigenous Culture Fund.)

If 2018 might be viewed as a year of new beginnings, 2019 looks right now to be a year of new constellations: a repositioning and a rediscovery of our many bright talents. The same way the Art Gallery of Ontario’s potent Rebecca Belmore survey last year recognized one of the country’s true art stars, there are a slate of opportunities ahead for Torontonians to get a good look at some of Canada’s most celebrated contemporary artists, including major shows for Kinngait illustrator Shuvinai Ashoona and sculptor Brian Jungen, and the inaugural edition of the Toronto Biennial of Art.

Here’s a look back at some of the year’s biggest moments, as well as a few items to look forward to:

Kusama-mania

It began in the dying days of 2017, when demand for admission to the AGO tour stop of renowned Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama’s Infinity Mirrors exhibition overwhelmed the gallery’s advance ticketing website. Hopefuls waited daily in rush lines snaking down Dundas St. for their own 30-second visits with infinity. It was a blockbuster unlike any before, drawing more than 169,000 attendees. (And a highly coveted photo op that surely influenced the cottage industry of made-for-Instagram museums opened since.) The gallery wanted to commemorate the adventure by buying one of Kusama’s mirrored rooms for its own holdings. It hoped the unprecedented demand might translate into a successful crowdfunding campaign to cover some large part of the acquisition cost. The effort fell short by about half, but the AGO decided to go ahead with the purchase anyhow.

401 Richmond, an arts haven

To witness the breadth of Toronto’s creative industries, bounce around the galleries, orgs and studios of 401 Richmond for an hour or two. It is a hive vital to cultural work in the city. Since 2016, however, tenants there were endangered by a property assessment based on the “highest and best use,” calling for exorbitant tax hikes. By 2020, their tax bill would triple from its 2012 rate. It was a case of the city determined by the open market versus, as critic Murray Whyte put it, “the city in which we want to live.” After concerted pleas for relief, the province stepped in with a new tax subclass for arts havens like 401. Then, in February 2018, the saga settled temporarily when council voted in favour of a 50 per cent property tax reduction for such “creative co-location” spaces — the impact of which it will review again in 2019.

A new Museum of Contemporary Art for Toronto

After closing its Queen West location in August 2015, MOCA has re-emerged brawnier and more beautiful with 55,000 square feet across five floors of the old Tower Automotive building on Sterling Rd. Inside thrums a brand new arts hub, sharing space with outfits such as the affordable studio provider Akin Collective and long-running, artist-run centre Art Metropole. It’s opening exhibition, titled Believe, felt something like a mission statement about what any new Museum of Contemporary Art ought to be and do. It was also a total star turn for locals Nep Sidhu and Rajni Perera.

Looking forward: major shows, major artists

Opening Jan. 26, the Power Plant will explore two decades of the visionary, world-conjuring ink and pencil crayon drawings of Inuit graphic artist Shuvinai Ashoona. Running at roughly the same time, Oakville Galleries will turn its two venues over to Montreal’s Valérie Blass, known for her comic, dark and surreal sculpture. Blass won the 2017 Gershon Iskowitz Prize, which — though not yet announced — customarily comes with a major exhibition at the AGO, something more to anticipate. Then in June, sculptor and installation artist Brian Jungen, who fashions masks (from Nike sneakers, for example) inspired by those of the Northwest Coast peoples or makes totem pole forms from golf bags, will be treated to a large solo show at the AGO. And finally, for September 2019 and on for 90 days, Toronto will get its own biennial. The first Toronto Biennial of Art will bring national and international artists to respond to sites and venues along Toronto’s waterfront. Curator Candice Hopkins promises plenty of new commissions and lots of local talent.

Get more of what matters in your inbox

Start your morning with everything you need to know, and nothing you don't. Sign up for First Up, the Star's new daily email newsletter.

More from The Star & Partners

More Entertainment

Top Stories

Copyright owned or licensed by Toronto Star Newspapers Limited. All
rights reserved. Republication or distribution of this content is
expressly prohibited without the prior written consent of Toronto
Star Newspapers Limited and/or its licensors. To order copies of
Toronto Star articles, please go to: www.TorontoStarReprints.com